Book 1: The Dragonet Prophecy
This page is about the first book: The Dragonet Prophecy. It may contain spoilers. Description Clay and his friends have grown up under a mountain, secretly raised by the Talons of Peace to fulfill a mysterious prophecy. The five young dragons are destined to end the war that's been raging between the tribes of Pyrrhia -- but how they'll do this, none of them knows. But not every dragonet wants a destiny. When one of their own is threatened, Clay and his friends decide to escape. Maybe they can break free and end the war at the same time -- or maybe they'll risk everything ... Prologue Hvitur, a member of the Talons of Peace, has the Skywing egg that will fulfill the prophecy. Unfortunately, he meets Burn on the way, who promptly drops the egg off a cliff and orders her guards to kill Hvitur. Without one dragonet, the prophecy cannot be fulfilled! Webs, another Talon, takes a Rainwing egg as the replacement. Summary Part 1: Under the Mountain Clay, Tsunami, Glory, Starflight, and Sunny have lived under a mountain, raised by three members of the Talons of Peace: Kestrel, Dune, and Webs. Kestrel hates them and is very cruel to them during their physical training. Kestrel always tells Clay to find his savage personality inside, telling him that when he was out of his egg, he started trying to attack the others. One day, a Nightwing--Morrowseer--comes to discuss the dragonets with the guardians. Glory is a Rainwing, even though the prophecy calls for a Skywing, so the guardians have always been especially cruel to her. Morrowseer orders for them to kill her. The five dragonets find this out by eavesdropping. The five dragonets then try to hatch a plan to escape from the cave, but it is made difficult when Tsunami is punished and chained by the river. Clay swims in the river, but starts to drown. Just as he is about to drown, Tsunami saves him and explains that Sunny and Starflight had melted the chains off of her using their fire. They eventually swim/fly out of the cave, and Clay feels mud for the first time, which makes him feel stronger and happier, as he is a Mudwing. They meet another dragon: a Skywing. And not just any Skywing: the queen, Queen Scarlet. She is about to capture them when Tsunami stabs her tail and the two escape. They look for the cave and see the smoke signal that Clay had told Sunny and Starflight to make from burning scrolls. Then the pair open the boulder and find Sunny, Starflight, and Glory already there, ready to leave. But just as they are about to escape, Queen Scarlet enters, having found them from the smoke signal. The three guardians are outraged, and Queen Scarlet seems to recognize Kestrel. She kills Dune and Webs flees. Then she orders her guards to cage Kestrel and the five dragonets. Part 2: In the Sky Kingdom The next thing Clay knows, he's at the Skywing palace. Or, more exactly, in a cage next to Queen Scarlet's arena. A Skywing named Peril wakes him up by throwing a piece of meat into his face. He immediately throws up over the edge. They have a friendly conversation, which reveals that Peril is Queen Scarlet's arena champion. The next day, Clay and every other dragon in the cages surrounding the arena watch Peril, who fights a dragon named Horizon. Clay is astonished to see that Horizon lights on fire and burns to ashes, but it seems that Peril is only touching him! Queen Scarlet also shows Glory, who she calls her "art". That night, Peril comes back to visit him. She tells him her story, and why she burns things that she touches. When she was in her egg, she had a twin brother, also in that egg. Peril took all the fire out of him, killing him in the process. Knowing this, her mother abandoned her, and Queen Scarlet found her and became her mother. She also tells him that Starflight will be fighting in the arena next. Clay is horrified and pleads her to tell Queen Scarlet to put him in the arena instead. She reluctantly agrees, and Clay is put into the arena with a dragon named Fjord. Fjord is about to kill Clay when he mysteriously dies from venom. Clay is confused, and believes that the venom was shot from Queen Scarlet. Peril decides to tell Clay where Sunny is being caged if he hides her during Kestrel's trial, which she really wants to see. He later agrees, and figures out that there is the possibility of Kestrel being Peril's mother, and worries how she will react if it is true. He also worries how Kestrel will react to learn that her daughter is alive. The next day, the trial takes place with Vermilion, Scarlet's son, and Osprey against each other. Scarlet is obviously biased towards Vermilion's side. Osprey explains the full story. Remember Peril's story? That wasn't true at all! Kestrel was put into the breeding program, and soon laid an egg. Peril sucked all the fire out of her twin brother. Kestrel was then ordered to kill both dragonets and stay out of the breeding program forever. Kestrel had tried to escape with both of her dragonets, but was caught by Queen Scarlet by the Diamond Spray River. Queen Scarlet told her that she could live if she killed one of her dragonets. Kestrel killed the boy with her own claws, then tried to fly away with Peril. Unfortunately, she was forced to drop her because of her firescales. That is why Kestrel has burns on her palms and talons. Peril is outraged and flies into the arena as Queen Scarlet tells her guards to kill Kestrel. Peril protects Kestrel with the Champion's Shield, an old act that allows her to stand for a prisoner by fighting a combatant in the arena. Scarlet deduces that Osprey taught Peril about the Champion's Shield. Scarlet kills Osprey and dismisses her. That night, Burn comes to take Sunny to put in her weirdling collection and to celebrate Scarlet's hatching day. Clay, in a useless attempt to communicate with Peril, uses a wire she burned through to start playing a song, The Dragonets Are Coming. (Tsunami used to sing that song loudly to annoy the three guardians underground. It is supposed to be a bar song.) All the prisoners in the arena begin to sing eerily and sadly. Scarlet takes him, Tsunami, and Starflight into Peril's room. She puts burning rocks in the entrance to make sure that they won't escape. Starflight notices Peril and they ask her to move the burning rocks. On the way out, they notice Sunny hanging over the main hall in a giant cage. Sadly, Peril betrays them. Clay accidentally pushes Peril, thus figuring out he is immune to fire. The SkyWing queen takes them back, and Starflight explains Clay's immunity. Clay was born with a blood red egg, which shows his immunity to fire. The next day, Tsunami is taken into the arena, and Clay and Starflight are taken to the queen's balcony. Tsunami fights an insane SeaWing, Gill, and pins him down, explaining that she could win without killing him. Queen Scarlet taunts her, and Tsunami kills Gill. Starflight is next to fight against Tsunami, but the two refuse to fight. Then, they are forced to face scavengers. Two of the four were killed, and they are told to face IceWings. Morrowseer arrives with some NightWing soldiers and they kill the IceWings. They save only Starflight. Scarlet, enraged, finally places Clay against Peril. Peril is not used to actually fighting, and is pinned down by Clay because of his immunity to her scales. Queen Scarlet asks him to use his venom. Suddenly, Glory breaks off of the chain and spits venom at Burn, who pushes Scarlet in front of her. The venom hits Scarlet's face, and then the entire arena flees in terror. In all of the confusion, the three dragonets escape and find Sunny's cage once again, which Peril melts. They also save Kestrel and say their goodbyes to her and Peril. Kestrel also tells them where some of their eggs are from, and Tsunami learns that she is a Seawing princess, just like in her favorite scroll. Then the four dragonets fly to the Mud Kingdom, hoping that Clay will find his family soon. Part 3: An Egg the Color of Dragon Blood Clay and Glory go into the Mud Kingdom, searching for his parents. He learns that his mother is Cattail, who sold him to the Talons of Peace for a few cows, which she was supposed to breed but then ate instead. Sadly, Clay starts to leave but then meets his siblings and learns that he is their bigwings! His siblings are Reed (current bigwings), Marsh, Umber, Sora, and Crane, who had died that day in a battle. Clay learns that he had not been trying to kill the other dragonets at birth at all! He was just instinctively trying to help them out of their eggs. The dragonets meet Starflight as they fly to the Sea Kingdom and rejoice that they are together once again. Other * There is a graphic novel of this book, made by Barry Deutsch. Book 1: The Dragonet Prophecy